NPD Assistant

The Collective Network Limited; Walkern; On-site; GBP 27,000 - 33,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Growing business

Exposure to major UK and international

Supportive team

Job summary

The Collective Network Limited in Stevenage is seeking an NPD Assistant to drive new product development from brief to launch. In this hands-on role you’ll reformulate recipes, create samples, and support pre-production trials to ensure viability.

You’ll coordinate with suppliers for specs and certifications, test micro and nutritional aspects, and hand finished products to Production. A strong NPD background and current food safety knowledge are essential.

Qualifications

• Proven NPD experience with solid product development capability.
• Ability to manage own workload without supervision.
• Up-to-date food safety knowledge and practices.
• Experience liaising with suppliers for specs and certifications.

Responsibilities

• Interpret customer briefs and determine what is commercially and technically realistic.
• Deliver finished products to Production rather than just giving a recipe.
• Chase suppliers for specs and certification; arrange micro and nutritional testing when needed.
• Maintain active customer contact through sample visits and timelines.

Skills

NPD experience

Product development

Workload management

Food safety knowledge

Job description

NPD Assistant

Stevenage

Up to £30,000

This is a hands-on NPD role.

Not a "help with market research and occasionally look at a spreadsheet" role. You'll be in the kitchen making samples, reformulating recipes that don't quite work yet, and then standing in during a pre-production trial hoping the thing that worked on a small scale still works at full scale. It doesn't always.

The business works across a range of products, all ambient stable.. If you want to be working with a company that right at the front of the all the trends in the industry, this one would be for you.

You'll report to the Technical Manager, but you won't be sat in Technical's shadow. You're expected to interpret a customer brief properly, work out what's commercially and technically realistic, and then actually deliver it. That means chasing suppliers for specs and certification, arranging micro and nutritional testing when it's needed, and handing a finished product over to Production in a state where they can actually run with it, not just receiving a recipe and a shrug.

There's customer contact too. Sample visits, requests that land with no notice, deadlines that don't move just because the trial didn't go to plan first time. If you want a role where nothing changes week to week, this isn't it.

What they need from you:

• proper NPD experience
• a solid handle on product development
• the ability to manage your own workload without someone stood over you
• food safety knowledge that's current, not something you did a course on five years ago and haven't thought about since.

What you get in return:

• a business that's actually growing
• real exposure to major UK and international food service, retail and hospitality brands
• a team that will back you if you take ownership of the work